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THE

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Issue #52, Mid January Edition 2021

£1

Equality Democracy Truth Courage

Outcry as Tory pals pocket school kids’ dinner money

THE PEOPLE’S PAPER

THREE STRIKES AND GET HER OUT

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BANGED TO RIGHTS DITCHING 400,000 CRUCIAL CRIMINAL RECORDS AND DNA EVIDENCE Junior Minister, Kit Malthouse also clueless

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ackie lker

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Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

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THE STANCE THAT OUTRAGED AND ROCKED THE WHITE WORLD

History behind ‘Taking the knee’

he first people to ‘take the knee’ were American football players in 2016 who knelt during the US national anthem to protest against police violence and racism. Many saw this as a direct challenge to the American anthem, in particular the last line which claims that the US is ‘the land of the free and the home of the brave.’ But the story of sporting stars protesting about racism

Blair visits the USA

RAISING A FIST OF RESISTANCE DURING THE AMERICAN NATIONAL ANTHEM RUINED THE CAREERS OF ALL THREE MEN

American national anthem ruined the careers of all three men.

goes back more than half a century.

South Africa, deliberately stood alongside in solidarity.

It’s an unforgettable image: two black athletes Tommie Smith (gold) and John Carlos (bronze) pictured) each raised a gloved fist on the winner’s podium in the 1968 Olympics.

Never mind the carnage of American racism, including the beatings, shootings and murders by state armed police of unarmed black people, the objections to what was seen as the aggressive gesture of standing and raising a gloved fist of resistance during the Olympic playing of the

For all those complaining about ‘letting politics into sport’ my answer is – get real. Whether you like it or not, politics is part of life, all aspects of it. Racism IS political. It’s about power. And just remember, whether you stand, or kneel, like a few Millwall supporters, some people will always find a reason why you should have done it some other way, or better still, had just been silent.

New dark age of oppression We are all entering a new dark age where the psychotic one per cent have found a way of control and oppression that no longer needs an open killing war.

these and more were accepted means of establishment control. For instance: hundreds of years of blatant and drip fed propaganda was needed against black people.

For the last two decades they have looked to bamboozle us with a succession of wars against: terrorism, drugs, racism, sexism, anti-Semitism and now, the war against “the virus.”

Without it how could slavery ever have been justified? Take away a person’s humanity and all was possible.

When it suited the “elite” all

Dear Comrade Starmer

There’s a history to the Black Lives Matter protest at Millwall Football Club

Silver medallist, Peter Norman of Australia, a country as racists then as apartheid

The war on drugs leaves out the history of the British Empire. In the 19th century two wars were fought to force China

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to import opium from Britain.

As for terrorism, the USA alone has at least 135 military bases in other countries. The world only has around 200 countries in total. And everyone on the left should now know that the recent fake anti-Semitism war of words against Jeremy Corbyn and the socialists means that no one is allowed to question the Israeli apartheid state. Even the leading Israel human rights organisation B’Tselem describes Israel and the Palestinian lands its military forces illegally occupy as an apartheid regime, a description Zionists vehemently reject. To win they need to divide us. For us to win we need to recognise their task and stay

On a recent trip to the United States , Tony Blair, former UK Prime Minister and now UN Middle East Peace Envoy, addressed a major gathering of Native American Indians. He spoke for almost two hours on his success in bringing about a lasting peace settlement amongst the warring nations of the Middle East, likening it to the way that the US Government found a suitable agreement with the North American tribes. At the conclusion of his speech, the crowd presented him with a plaque inscribed with his new Indian name Walking Eagle. A very chuffed Tony then departed in his motorcade, waving to the crowds. A news reporter later asked one of the Indians how they came to select the new name given to Tony Blair They explained that Walking Eagle is the name given to a bird so full of shit that it can no longer fly.

undivided. It should be simple. Technology has allowed us an insight into parallel struggles around the world. Then it collected us, labelled us, and crushed us. Communities needed to be beaten back first. Places where the solid working class gathered and exchanged ideas were systematically dismantled. F o o t b a l l terraces, trade unions, local pubs, work places. Now it is the turn of countries. They are no longer needed to be manipulated with cries of patriotism. Sometimes a slightly freer country’s culture might infect anothers. This became dangerous for the graspers who have used

I want to draw your attention to an Ipsos Mori Poll which suggests that the public find Piers Morgan and press briefing journalists, are better than yourself at holding Boris Johnson’s government to account over its mishandling of the coronavirus crisis. In fact, the poll finds that the public think everyone is doing a better job than Starmer – except the Labour Party’s other spokespeople. Even among Labour voters, only 33% think Labour’s front bench team under Starmer is doing a good job. This is rather embarrassing, isn’t it? It does seem as though your so called ‘forensic’ approach is no match for Johnson’s buffoonery. Comradely Mike Larcey South West Norfolk CLP

capitalist power to hijack and cut across even any pseudodemocratic opposition. The way out of this “dark age” is still within us. We simply show solidarity with each other and put fairness above self. Solidarity is not showing support when it is in our interests to do so. Solidarity is recognising when the honourable decision needs supporting. Solidarity cannot be bartered, weighed or exchanged for other goods. Solidarity is not self-interest. Solidarity cannot be bought, bribed or threatened away. Solidarity is not a calculating means to an end but an end in itself. United we need to stand.

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£30 HAMPER IS £5 IN FOOD AND £25 PROFIT FOR COMPANY

Outcry as Tory pals pocket school kids’ dinner money

hown below is the measly meal for hungry school kids provided by the government’s chosen supplier Chartwells. According to these friends of Boris this pitiful selection of bits and pieces cost taxpayers £30. Next is what a non-profit making organisation supplies for the same £30. Even if Chartwells bought the food at top price Marks

Twitter has been going wild about the latest scandalous example of government cronyism and Spencer they could have provided much more, assuming they were not ripping off nearly 80% in profit. The government has responded by telling school heads not to provide any more free school meals or vouchers for disadvantaged children over the next half-term holiday.

Fresh guidance from the Department for Education published this week states: “Schools do not need to provide lunch parcels or vouchers during the February half-term.”Because, it says, there is government support for families and children outside of term-time through the Covid

#RightToFood banner at game Liverpool FC’s Kop carried the #RightToFood message and Man Utd Marcus Rashford’s #EndChildFoodPoverty – when the two teams meet on Sunday, reports Skwawkbox. Liverpool is expected to become the first city to recognise access to food as a human right, at a city council vote on Wednesday. Local MP Ian Byrne MP Byrne is taking

the campaign to Parliament with an Early Day Motion calling for the right to food to be enshrined in law. This will put the onus on government to ensure that scandals such as the recent paltry food ‘hampers’ for poor children can legally never be repeated, because the right to adequate nutrition will then be legal right.

winter grant scheme. The government set up the £170m winter package last November, following an earlier intervention by the footballer and anti-poverty campaigner Marcus Rashford, who has already forced the government into a series of U-turns over free school meals. The National Education Union (NEU) said, however, that disadvantaged families could end up missing out as a result of switching from provision via schools to councils. Kevin Courtney, NEU joint general secretary, said: “It is simply astonishing that the government has, once again, revealed its total disregard for

those hardest hit by the ongoing health pandemic. “After a year in which the stark inequalities faced by millions of children and young people has been at the forefront of the minds of the public, the ugly spectre of holiday hunger is now looming yet again.” The Local G ove r n m e nt Association urged ministers to continue to provide food vouchers to eligible families during halfterm, as it did last summer. A petition has been launched called Stop private firms profiteering from hungry children. Go to https://r.ippl.es/ meal-boxes/

Scores killed as Israeli war planes attack Syrian targets Reports of 18 Israeli air strikes fighters and 11 Afghan members on east Syria, carried out with of the pro-Iran Fatimid Brigade, US provided intelligence, said the Syrian Observatory for killed 57 regime forces and Human Rights. allied Iran-backed fighters in the deadliest such The nationality of the strikes since the start remaining 16 people of the conflict, a who lost their lives in British based the 18 strikes was war monitoring not immediately group said on clear. TOTAL Wednesday (January 13). “This is the KILLED IN largest death toll OVERNIGHT The overnight from Israeli raids RAIDS raids, against arms in Syria,” said the depots and military Syrian Observatory’s positions killed at least 14 head, Rami Abdul Rahman. Syrian soldiers, 16 Iraqi militia

The official Syrian news agency said “the Israeli enemy carried out an aerial assault on the town of Deir Ezzor and the Albu Kamal region”, adding that “the results of the aggression are currently being verified”. A n Israeli a r m y spokesperson declined to comment. M e a n w h i l e residents of Beirut in Lebanon reported that Israeli military jets carried out several low flying flights over

the Lebanese capital overnight on Sunday.

Israel reportedly regularly violates Lebanon airspace, often to carry out strikes in neighboring Syria, but rarely comments on these reports.

Divers trace crash plane’s black box Indonesian navy divers searching the ocean floor have recovered the flight data recorder from the Air jet that crashed into the shallow Java Sea with 62 people on board. It is expected to help investigators determine what caused the Boeing 737-500 to nosedive into the ocean in heavy rain shortly after taking off from Jakarta last Saturday.

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Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

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EVERY MONTH SEES A NEW RESIGNATION OF LONG- TERM MEMBERS Jo Rust from Norfolk

Laura Edie from Kent

COUNCILLORS DESERT THE STARMER PARTY L

aura Edie who represents part of north Kent, announced she would be leaving the party over its refusal to stand by unions and protect school staff. “I just felt unable to stay in a party that didn’t represent my socialist values,” said Cllr Edie. “We are a party built on unions,” she continued, saying she felt the current Labour leader’s refusal to come out and back the teaching unions call for schools to remain closed undermined its position as the opposition and made them “complicit” in the government’s policies. The former Labour councillor sent an open letter to the Labour leader explaining her decision. It read: “I have tried to remain steadfast, but time and time again the Labour leadership has gone against core socialist principles and not put up a fight when the country is in a desperate situation. “With the death toll rising, as an opposition we needed to be standing up for citizens of the

Two Labour councillors and one ex-councillor have resigned from the party to reject its new right wing direction under Keir Starmer United Kingdom. “From not protecting human rights, voting for an incredibly flawed Tier system, a Brexit deal that will be detrimental to our living standards, and more recently an utter refusal to stand by unions and protect school staff.” Cllr Edie, the former shadow deputy leader of Dartford council, launched a petition calling for staff working in special educational needs settings to be prioritised for vaccinations alongside healthcare workers. Dartford Labour and Cooperative Group said they were “shocked and sad” to hear that Cllr Laura Edie has resigned from the Labour Party. “To see her sitting as an independent in the chamber will be most upsetting,” the party said in statement. “We believe she should resign her seat and stand again

at a by-election. She was elected on a Labour Party platform not as an Independent. The month before, December, Corbyn-stalwart, Luke Cresswell, announced his resignation from the party and his future plans to contest elections as an Independent. He already has a team of supporters, mainly former Labour members, in place. Cresswell, a teacher, was never welcomed in the rightdominated CLP officers who flew into a panic when members showed support for his attempt to be selected as the party’s candidate for the 2019 general election. Eastern Regional Labour Party officials immediately stepped in and barred Cresswell from the selection procedure on the grounds that although he had been fully cleared of bogus anti-semitism accusations years because of his open support for

Palestinian Jeremy Corbyn. r i g h t s , Rust had the false been a party a c c u s at i o n s member for 10 had tarred years and had him too been considered severely to for the marginal stand. seat of Norwich S o u t h North but was Suffolk CLP, disqualified in much like its a controversial neighbour and highly South West disputed internal Norfolk CLP, manoeuvrings is said to be by party officials. in a state of “I am now Luke Cresswell Suffolk near collapse sitting with the as Starmer’s Independent poisonous regime drives Group,” she said. The same socialists to resign. month five Lancaster city Luke said: “I’m really excited Labour councillors, including to be standing as an independent a council deputy leader, and look forward to challenging resigned in protest at what they the academisation of schools, described as the party’s “move outsourcing and privatisation rightward”. of public services.” And in November the Jo Nationally the party is Rust, deputy leader of the widely reported to have lost at labour group of councillors and least 100,000 members with three times official party general more to come. election candidate for North Actual figures are not West Norfolk CLP quit the party available as the party no longer in protest at the treatment of releases membership numbers.

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Mid January 2021

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‘COVERED IN BRUISES’ BUT NO EVIDENCE OF ‘EXCESSIVE FORCE’

PROBE INTO sudden death after police free man

he Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), has launched an investigation into the death of Mohamud Mohammed Hassan. Police said they were called by the ambulance service to a “multi-occupancy” property shortly after 10.30pm on Friday 8 January. Hassan was arrested at his Cardiff home on suspicion of breach of the peace but released without charge the following morning. By Saturday evening he had died. His family said he had claimed to have been assaulted in custody beforehand. South Wales police said it had found no evidence of excessive force or misconduct. IOPC director for Wales, Catrin Evans, said preliminary indications were that there

The sudden and unexplained death of a 24-year-old man hours after his release from Cardiff police station has been described by the Welsh first minister as described “deeply concerning” was no physical trauma injury to explain the cause of death. Toxicology tests would be needed. Speaking in the Welsh parliament, Mark Drakeford, offered his condolences to Hassan’s family. “Our thoughts must be with the family of a young man who was a fit and healthy individual whose death must be properly investigated,” he said. The Plaid Cymru leader, Adam Price, told the parliament: “Witnesses were reportedly shocked by Mr Hassan’s condition on his release, saying his tracksuit was covered in blood and he had severe injuries and bruising. “There can be no doubt this is a deeply harrowing case. Why

was Mohamud Hassan arrested, what happened during his arrest, did he have legal representation, was there any after care; why did this young man die?” Price asked the first minister to do “everything in your power to help the family find those answers”. The Plaid leader reminded the parliament of previous controversial investigations involving South Wales police including the murder of Lynette White, which led to the Cardiff Three miscarriage of justice, and the death of schoolboy Christopher Kapessa, following which his mother, Alina Joseph, accused the police of institutional racism. Price asked Drakeford: “Do you understand why so many people of colour sympathise

with that statement? The Plaid leader also pointed out that only 2.6% of South Wales police officers were from black and ethnic minority backgrounds when they made up 6.7% of the population. He also said black people in Wales were more likely to end up in prison than their US counterparts. Hassan’s aunt, Zainab Hassan, said she saw her nephew within an hour of his release. “He had lots of wounds on his body and lots of bruises,” she said. “He didn’t have these wounds when he was arrested and when he came out of Cardiff Bay police station, he had them. “Nothing we do is going to bring him back, but we will not rest for a second until we have justice.”

On Tuesday afternoon, about 200 people gathered outside Cardiff Bay police station and flares were let off to protest over Hassan’s death. Demonstrators chanted “no justice, no peace” and demanded the force release CCTV of Hassan’s time in custody, while some held signs that read “Black Lives Matter” and “stop police brutality”. One protester, Bianca Ali, 29, said: “We want justice, we want transparency, we want answers, we want the truth.” Hilary Brown, a solicitor and director of Virgo Consultancy, said a complaint had been made to the IOPC. The family would be seeking an independent pathologist report and called for an independent police force to investigate the issue. A postmortem examination was due to take place on Tuesday.

Charges expected soon in US water scandal Former Michigan governor Rick Snyder, his health director and other ex-officials are expect to be charged after a new investigation of the Flint water scandal. The citizens of majority Black city had their health destroyed by lead-contaminated drinking water and a deadly outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease. The attorney general’s office declined to c o m m e nt

on details of the ongoing investigation other than to confirm investigators were “working diligently” and “will share more as soon as we’re in a position to do so”. Snyder, a Republican, was governor when state-

appointed managers switched the city’s water supply to the Flint River in 2014 to save money while a pipeline was being built to Lake Huron. But the Flint water was not treated lead leached from old pipes supplying nearly 100,000 residents and their children. The disaster made Flint a nationwide symbol of government mismanagement, with residents lining up for bottled water and parents fearing their children had suffered permanent brain damage. The poisoning

was seen as an example of environmental and racial injustice. At the same time, bacteria in the water was blamed for an outbreak of deadly Legionnaires disease. Authorities counted at least 90 cases in one county, including a dozen deaths. The outbreak was announced by Snyder and Lyon in January 2016, although Lyon conceded that he knew that cases were being reported many months before. In 2018, Lyon was ordered

to trial on involuntary manslaughter charges after a special prosecutor accused him of failing to timely inform the public about the outbreak. His attorneys argued there was not enough solid information to share earlier. By June 2019, the investigation was turned upside down. Prosecutors working under a new attorney general, dismissed the case against Lyon as well as charges against seven more people and said the probe would start again.

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Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

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THE CHILD-LIKE GREEN GODESS IS AN INVENTION OF HER TIME

Greta Thunberg returns to preach

very era seems to need a female symbol of purity: Mary, mother of Jesus, Joan of Arc, Elizabeth I there are more. Take, Joan, for instance. A child with visions of God. The French needed a figure to rally around rather than their ineffectual royal family. Joan’s father (a middle class social climber) was happy to provide one. The “nobility” of France had a deniable asset. Their battle cries echoed to the shouts of “God is on our side.” How could the opposition deny these visions from a purer place?

Deluded The poor deluded child, coached by rich interests helping to secure power by proclaiming the undeniable right of her cause… sound

Seen by some as the thinking-man’s fantasy girl (she’s 18 but looks as if she’s 12) trolls back from Scandinavia familiar? Did Joan’s handlers believe in God? Do Greta’s believe in anything but power and money?

Deluded

If you believe in the Immaculate Conception you can believe in Thunberg. If you believe in Joan’s Sainthood then you will have no trouble with Thunberg. If you think Joan was a used and abused Asperger’s sufferer then you can guess at Thunberg’s future. Like Joan, who dressed as a boy, Greta hides her sexuality under schoolgirl pigtails.

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Elizabeth and Mary mother of Christ were, of course, virgins. This gives the undiluted fantasy of them to all men who need it. A simple psychological trick. In Elizabeth’s case she created herself for her own ruthless aims. The others mentioned were used and tossed aside by the makers of elitist history. Elizabeth WAS elitist history. Greta is not good or bad or even important. She just is. What is relevant is the channelling of energy and resources into a place that is used to create wealth and power rather than a movement to create fairness. By all means worship Mary and Greta but remember that societal change comes from hard work, dedication and selflessness not from Hollywood;. Although I am sure we will all enjoy a Judy Garland singing “somewhere over the rainbow” in Greta the musical.

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH Q by Peter Loo Peter Loo tracks down the infamous Q Anon and interviews him on a 17 bus from Manchester to Rochdale. Peter) May we call you Q for short? Q Anon) Of course you can, my friend Donny does. Peter) Where do you get all your secret information from? Q Anon) The White house. Peter) How is it passed to you? Q Anon) It comes to me when I am on the toilet. Peter) that’s a load of… Q Anon) No, it’s a movement; and a big one at that, the best. Peter) Where did you get the name Q from? Q Anon) I was at a bus stop and I saw a sign saying queue here. Peter) And the name, Anon? Q Anon) Before I dropped out of school I read a poem by a guy called Anon and liked his name. I thought it was real cool. Peter) Some people might say you are dissolute and nefarious; how would you answer that? Q Anon) I would ask my friend, Boris what dissolute and nefarious meant. He is really clever; he speaks Latin and geek. Peter) Do you think it’s right that an armed band of wild thugs should try to take a country over? Q Anon) How do you think Queen Elizabeth’s ancestors got to be in charge? Peter) What do you think would have happened if the people attacking the Capitol had been black? Q Anon) We would have shot them of course…der. Peter) What will happen now? Q Anon) By the 4th of January we will rise up and drain the swamp of all the pedo’s. Peter) That was weeks ago and I would like to point out that Trump and Jeffrey Epstein were good friends. Q Anon) Oh. Come away, come away, and come away, Dixie land.

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STARMER’S VALUES ‘AID CAPITAL AND BAN CRITICISM OF ISRAEL’ PRITI PATEL, DELETED IN ERROR

Did I get that right or is it just a hope? More than 400,000 police records lost by the Home office. I bet it was all the fault of some dastardly descendent of refugees to whom they gave a job. Name of Patel perhaps? Meanwhile, Benito Johnson must surely be celebrating that on this day, in what we used to call BC 67, the ROMAN EMPIRE began. Octavian became Augustus, thereby enabling Edward Gibbon to write THE HISTORY OF THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. The first volume was published in 1776. Something else happened that year which prompted my wife to become an expert on America’s greatest general, Charles Lee from Chester. Washington? Rubbish. But those words, DECLINE and FALL. I have just read a yet to be published article on Lebanon today. While reading I could not confine my perspective to a single country. ‘Disintegration’ was the word that came to mind. As a Republic Rome had some pretentions to democracy. There were limits to the number of years politicians could hold high office. Being a citizen meant something. Saint Paul was proud to be a Roman citizen. Afterwards it was individual Emperors that were key. Yes there was huge expansion but, like some businesses, expansion brings its problems. One of them is that to stay in existence the expansion must keep going. At some point sustaining all this becomes difficult, even impossible. Just as capitalism mutates and becomes chaos. Trumpus Maximus is about to become Trumpus Minimus. How healthy today is the American Empire? Is Biden, like so many Roman Emperors, going to have to devote his time to sweeping up the mess of a predecessor? The ‘British’, really the English Empire still exists of course. It exists as a label on a lot of medals. “Get your OBEs here”. And yet again I am thinking disintegration. Benito wants a United Kingdom, a bigger Empire for himself. But lazy emperors who don’t read the small print don’t cut it. I used to call Cameron the prime minister for Oxfordshire but for our present prime minister the Empire is fast shrinking to Bullingdonia. Who shall be our Last Emperor? Perhaps we could promote another of Caligula’s horses. The way things are going both the USA and the UK could be DELETED IN ERROR.

Labour Party is now in a state of civil political war

We have a divided Tory Party but for now I want to concentrate on Labour. We could roughly divide that party into people who think politics is all about obtaining and clinging to power and those that see it as all about values.

he power-minded people have a relatively straightforward task: do what you have to, say what you must, anything to get hold of power.

threat. He was, therefore, assassinated, helped by the fact that he, like ancient Roman statesman Cicero, presented his neck to the slayers.

When Palestinians defend themselves against their military occupation (much like the French resistance) they become ‘terrorists’. The reservation does nothing but shrink.

The values-minded people have a more difficult task: choosing which values matter most and convincing others to share and support them is not always so easy.

And so to Starmer. At first it looks easy to classify him as a comforter of the prosperous: no revolutionary he. But, like so many revolutionaries, he is intolerant, and is obsessed.

The ‘Values People’ get in his way because they threaten him with arguments based upon socialism, even, heaven forfend, international socialism. Starmer is a Capitalist Accommodator.

Now to make it all a bit more complicated. Corbyn found it relatively easy to appeal to people who wished to live in a more equal, a fairer, society. It looks as though he easily won the majority of the votes of the under 45s. But a more equal and fair society suggests that existing

holders of economic power will be discomforted. It was such people who found it so easy to support Blair. If so we have a link between the prosperous and the power-hungry. Corbyn was much more than a nuisance to such people: he was a hindrance and a

He is dangerously close to forbidding all but the gentlest criticism of Israel, if any. He would probably insist that he also supports the subjugated Palestinians but, like John Wayne, he wants them to stay on the tiniest of reservations, dictated by Israel..

He does not show up on the Socialism Detector. He does on the Establishment Detector. And, on the Likudnik Detector, where his pinging drowns out everything else. The question for the valuesminded is, stay and fight the power-minded or leave and promote their values. Which is it to be?

The Left needs a new socialist party WE are faced with a Tory Party devoted to selfishness and devoid of old fashioned, posh patronising of the poor - and a Labour Party unable to spell Robespierre and in thrall to anti-Jewish Zionism. Starmer is a waste of philosophical and socialist, space. Might a new political party, a real socialist party, be a good idea? I have often posted my fantasy of an Allotment Party. I imagine an Executive meeting

discussing re-nationalisation while spreading their toast with Corbyn’s fully organic homemade jam. What could be better? What I do not want is to repeat my experience of being employed under Militant in Liverpool. Yes, I still have the Redundancy Notice they handed me somewhere. Trotsky was assassinated so we might be expected to sympathise with him. But he, Lenin and Stalin had in common a belief that they knew best.

Neither Marx nor Engels went that far. Would either of them sent anyone to a Gulag? For me to be Left means losing a few arguments, having untidy values but yet pushing for an equality allied to fulfilment. Frankly, I am scared of political parties. They are too much like religions. What kind of Catholic, of Protestant, of, you name it, are you? I want to simplify. In what kind of society do you… me ... wish to live?

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NHS undermined by private companies A

replaceable and worthless. Many of them were not even consulted before being handed over. Where is the transparency? Outsourcing has led to multiple employers operating within the NHS causing a dangerous fragmentation in delivery of services to patients. Outsourced workers are often cut off from the key communications and resources they need to do their jobs effectively, as well as the protective equipment (PPE) that would ensure safety at work. The year on year pay cuts

lthough I am a proud and passionate nurse I am currently exhausted, overworked and extremely worried about the future of our NHS. I am the lead campaigner for Chesterfield NHS Workers Say NO and on the Core Leadership Team for Nurses United UK. We are all campaigning to save the NHS and keep to public and ensure everyone has the right to free healthcare. Over the past few years we have seen NHS staff being handed over to private firms, which makes them feel

“HOSPITAL BOSSES MUST GO!”

Richford born at Margate’s QEQM Hospital in 2017.

Health campaigners are calling for the sacking of the bosses of East Kent Hospitals University Foundation Trust.

“On top of all this,” Jon says, “they’ve played a decisive part in a process which threatens the permanent closure of Thanet’s only stroke unit in Margate hospital. This puts stroke sufferers in this area over an hour away from emergency treatment.”

The trust, whose hospitals include Margate, Canterbury and Ashford, has been guilty of appalling incompetence, according to Save Our NHS in Kent (SONIK) SONIK chair Jon Flaig says: “The trust bosses have presided over a culture of bullying, been engulfed in a baby deaths scandal and have been disastrously negligent in their handling of the Covid crisis.” In 2014 the Care Quality Commission (CQC) found the trust to be “totally inadequate” in safety and leadership, More than 40% of hospital staff said they were victims of harassment, bullying or abuse by colleagues. In July 2020 it was reported

that NHS staff have experienced is driving staff away. In real terms, the NHS staff has lost out on 20% of their pay over the last 10 years. The only message we are getting from the Government is, “your worthless, despite you battling on the frontline of COVID, you are only worth a clap”. This needs to change. We have 45k nursing vacancies and only more leaving weekly. What incentive do we have to remain? Matt Tacey Nurse from Chesterfield

Mr Flaig says: “Our NHS bosses have to go and we have to have a new system in which the people who run our hospitals are truly accountable to the public.” SONIK has launched a petition calling for the sacking of the bosses of the trust which can be found on https://www. change.org/p/east-kent-nhsbosses-must-go that the number of people dying of Covid-19 in the trust’s hospitals accounted for almost a

quarter of all deaths in England. In October 2020 it was

announced that the trust will be prosecuted over the “avoidable death” of seven-day-old Harry

Norman Thomas / Save Our NHS in Kent (SONiK)

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The Patient’s Eye

Here I am still locked down

y 300+ days of selfshielding have been quite comfortable; the frenetic pace of my life has slowed, I spend less money, everything I need is delivered to me, and the steady stream of unexpected guests has finally stopped with the exception of those leaving gifts on the front doorstep, phoning me, and chatting through the window as though I were in prison. This is a pleasant “own-gaol” of my making; I pre-empted the Fool when he spoke of the virus “working its way” through

communities: “Loved ones will position clear as a mountain die before their time.” Truly, spring, I can agree publicly we have dead friends and with Colin Crilly that the neighbours. Two of our government’s response to children have suffered Corona-crisis is driven the virus, and I can THIS IS A by its own interests tell you that it isn’t not ours. For sure, PLEASANT fake; it’s serious and they are obliged “OWN-GAOL” to issue guidance debilitating. They now suffer from (wickedly late each OF MY ‘Long Covid’ where time,) restrictions MAKING ( c o m p l e t e l y serious symptoms persist; one has been shambolic, and prone to left with an irregular U-turns and contradictions,) heartbeat in remembrance of and financial support (given as its visit. though from a secret pocket in Boris’s underpants, and Right, so now I’ve made my earmarked for eventual return

to him and his pals.) Bodies - quangos, bingobangos, and Orang-Utangoes have been set up, with various chums paid a king’s ransom for “don’t-track-and-trace properly,” “rolling out” the vaccine, and “masterminding” public health mismanagement. Money rises without trace, disappearing with the same alacrity; fortunes are made and it isn’t by health and care workers, school staff, or people who deliver to your door. MBEs will eventually be

Bodies have been set up, with various chums paid a king’s ransom for health mismanagement

awarded; few if any to bus, taxi, and van drivers or staff who work on trains. Are politicians trying to kill us? Does the Pope defecate in the woods? Is the bear a Catholic? The truth is somewhere in there. Patient.I

Covid’s used as a cover for the privatisation end game For decades now, successive governments have overseen the push to privatise healthcare in this country. The Health & Social Care Act in 2012 removed our government’s legal responsibility to provide us with universal health care, and now the Coronavirus Act 2020 may well finish off the job completely.

As with many of the socalled terror laws in this country, and the notorious Patriot Act in the U.S., much of the content of the Coronavirus Act had already been written before the disaster that led to its inception. In other words, the climate is being used as an excuse to push through measures that parliament

could not have got away with otherwise. Part of the new act allows ALL of our medical records to be passed to parties other than the NHS. So our most intimate details are now in the hands of many profiteering private health companies and insurance groups. I’m sure you saw this

on the mainstream news. Fear of the virus, much of which has been exaggerated, has left many of us uncertain, and campaigns largely inactive. Now is not the time to switch off. We know that many of those who are promoting the fear and confusion are the very ones who have been undermining our health

service. In 2002/3, many months of lies (government and media) led to an illegal war (killing around a million). Don’t allow a similar deception to happen again. Colin Crilly South London campaigner

Rape victim says Tory attacker is a monster A woman on Saturday talked of the ¬campaign of control and sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of a “monster” Tory MP. The aide alleges one of the attacks was in the former minister’s parliamentary office – as other MPs worked nearby. She claims police did not fully investigate her allegations and failed to follow up a number of lines of inquiry before shelving the case last month. She is refusing to abandon her bid to see the politician behind bars and is being advised by a top QC as she seeks to have the case reviewed.

A source said the woman had been through “utter hell” and had been subjected to verbal, mental and physical abuse that included shouting, screaming and rape. The woman’s mother says she feared for her daughter’s life after she found her “in shock, sobbing” and with scratches on her arms. The mother claims police dismissed her evidence and suggested her daughter might want to drop the case. On August 4 the Word named the alleged attacker as Mark Francois, MP for Rayleigh and Wickford, Essex,. Francois has always denied the claims. Last December police said they had

dropped the case because of inadequate evidence. But in claims which go to the heart of the corridors of power, the woman has told her lawyers:  Fourteen people with supporting evidence were never questioned.  Key texts and phone records were ignored.  Officers dismissed her claims because she had been in a relationship with the MP. Nigel Edwards QC has taken on her case. The maximum sentence for rape is life, with a minimum term of 19 years. She claimed the Westminster attack – one of four alleged

assaults – was in July 2019. the rape was in January It is alleged that: “The 2020. After the final attack happened the day incident, she called her after he’d threatened parents, who took her to her on a night out. He hospital. was shouting at her in The woman’s mother the street with raised fists, said: “I feared he’d kill or screaming in her face, seriously injure her. YEARS IN and swearing at her. All He was aggressive PRISON because she was late to throughout the MINIMUM dinner.” relationship and she’d The following day, he often ring me in tears. demanded she come to his office The woman, in her early 20s, and beg for his forgiveness. has since been diagnosed with That’s when one of the sexual PTSD and is on medication. assaults happened. In August, Tory chief whip The woman has told lawyers Mark Spencer came under fire for two sex assaults were in July refusing to withdraw the whip 2019, one was in October – and from the MP after his arrest.

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Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

thewordmedia.org

A PLAGUE ON ALL Your Houses!

e’ve all heard that old joke – how do you know when a politician is lying? His or her lips are moving!

If you really believe that our elected servants in the House creativity of our nation? The Treasury calls this of Commons are here to serve us, then please think again! common sense fiscal process up out of thin air as debt, just numbers on a computer screen… it’s called fraud!

Well, here’s my ‘joke’ – how do you know when a politician has absolutely nothing to offer? His or her lips keep uttering the words ‘Hope’ and ‘Change’. How about them uttering the words ‘Truth’ and ‘Solutions’? You will definitely never hear that! To put it bluntly, I’ve had enough of our political class and the whole rotten financial system it serves. I could now write thousands of words that would completely expose the fraud, deception, entrapment and the actual treason that’s being practised on those green leather benches in that overdressed Gothic megastructure in central London. Unfortunately, I’ve only been given around 500 words for this article, so I’ll do my best. Question! Why do we continue to collectively endorse our party political system when it clearly does not serve the interests of the ordinary people? Parliament is there to make life easy for the moneyed one per cent in their ivory ‘City of London’ tower. It doesn’t exist to help the ordinary people in the street like us. It’s all a criminal scam and here’s the proof. Please don’t groan, but I’m now going to write about money creation. I’m not an economist! And you are definitely going to be able to understand what I’m going to tell you! Just remember what a wit once said about economists God created economists to make astrologers look good!

And all this upheaval is there to make us, the people, desperate enough to welcome the World Economic Forum’s ‘Great Reset’…a global initiative that will take us all down a path towards a fascist future with the banksters firmly in charge. You’ve been warned! Look it up!

As the so-called ‘COVID-19 pandemic’ grinds on with ‘new strains’, more lockdowns and increasing restrictions on our freedoms, our economy is being deliberately trashed beyond all recognition. Tens of thousands of businesses

now face imminent collapse; millions of jobs are at risk; and the Chancellor of the Exchequer is ‘borrowing’ around £500 billions of ‘fresh air’ money from the banksters to increase our National Debt – money that has quite literally been conjured

But let’s get back to Rishi Sunak, our ‘hero’ who’s riding a wave of popularity at the moment for being a ‘caring’ Chancellor! Did you know that in 1914 the British Government, to avoid a complete collapse of the economy at the outbreak of the First World War, authorised HM Treasury (not the privatelycontrolled Bank of England) to create debt-free and interestfree money that was based firmly on the wealth, credit and

M0 at 100% - we call it Sovereign National Credit. It’s simple and it works! It doesn’t create inflation and it saved the nation’s economy in 1914. And even though it stopped a run on the banks, the banksters hated it as they were not involved and they couldn’t make any money from it. The £1 and Ten Shilling notes, which were called Bradbury’s after Sir John Bradbury who put his signature on them as First Secretary to the Treasury, could easily be re-issued today both in electronic form and as cash. According to the Office of National Statistics, our country is valued in the region of £30 trillion. We could easily put a trillion of that into the economy as debt-free and interest-free money that would save every business from collapse and every job! So, why aren’t we? It worked then and it would work today! Well, I’ve now well over my 500 so please go to

gone words

www. newchartistmovement. org.uk and look at my correspondence with our politicians. The Speaker of the House, Sir Lindsay Hoyle, refuses point blank to respond to me. Nor will the MPs who belong to the Treasury Select Committee. Nor will the Chancellor himself or even the Shadow Chancellor. They’re all in bed with the City of London! When will we finally realise that the House of Commons supports the banksters and not us, the people? Justin Walker

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POLITICS AND EVENTS

Mid January 2021

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GREY LIVES MATTER column

‘THE ONLY TRUE WISDOM, IS IN KNOWING YOU KNOW NOTHING‘ - SOCRATES What you believe about the Grey Vote (aged 50 to 100) and the state pension, has been lies over the decades. THERE WAS NO UK BABY BOOM IN THE 1950S AND 1960s The norm was 2.2 babes to replace two parents. URBAN MYTH THAT ALL GREY VOTE ONLY VOTE TORY Parliament does not gather data on what age votes for what party. UK HAS LOWEST STATE PENSION OF ANY RICH NATION ON EARTH The belief that all pensioners are better off than working age people, is incorrect, or else the high street shops would not have been closing at a fast pace, for decades, being as it is Grey Vote who go to shops. Lockdown is not the beginning of high street shutdowns. Retail analysists have known that for years. Most women, especially, do not get full state pension, due

inequalities in the workplace and in the pension system. ASSUMPTION OF CONTINUING LIFE FROM 50 TO 70 ENDED IN 2011 Life expectancy and pensioners increasing in number, is a lie. We are not. l We are already dead aged in

50s and 60s,

l dying quicker in retirement, l elderly pensioner deaths

increasing,

l long before 2020/21

airborne plague.

Back in 2005, the government’s actuaries informed Blair that pension age rise would result in a high increase of people long dead before retirement. As foretold, the 2011 pension age rise brought about the highest early death rate for half a century, of us 1950s born women, aged in our 50s and 60s. We also suffered loss of Pension Credit (as did men) benefit, from age 60 (Welfare Reform act 2012) til 66, now 67, that would have saved the lives of the poorest 1950s born ladies and gents.

Becoming the newest I Daniel Blakes, by losing poorest’s over 60s’ income support, with least chance of a new job, by age alone. Admin GREY SWANS pension campaign group into new socialist parties Scroll / swipe down my web page for full Grey Swans pension demands.

UNRAVELLING THE UNTRUTHS

It was a Bash Street school for me EUGENICS, a posh word for a stupid idea that my genetic makeup is superior to yours is worse than many forms of racism because it can hide itself so easily behind exams such as the 11-Plus. For as long as I have known Wirral (we used to call it The Wirral) thee has perpetuated the belief that at 11 young people can be divided into those worthy of a ‘good’ education and those who are not. Until, for a while, we were minded to think more equally in terms of comprehensive schools young people that ‘failed’ the 11Plus went to schools where there was only sufficient resources to provide an education for them up to the age of 14, later 15 but never 16. Why spend money on the ‘backward’? On a hill on the edge of West Kirby in The Wirral is the boys‘ grammar school attended by the husband of Theresa May.

He ‘passed’ the 11-Plus and was, therefore, selected as racially superior. As you might expect, further down the hill is the school for the racially inferior. Who went there? The actor currently p l a y i n g J a m e s Bond.

And now University College London (UCL) has apologised for its previous support of eugenics. They gave such a loud voice to Sir Francis Galton, father of the Eugenics Movement. Perhaps the University of Liverpool might at

least show s o m e regret at

appointing Cyril Burt as a lecturer in psychology. Or do they think that giving me, one of his 11-Plus victims, a job is sufficient compensation? As for Marie Stopes, was she not wonderful in promoting birth control? No, she very was not. Her hidden aim was that she wanted to reduce the breeding of the working class. The present UK government has not cast off its belief that some blood is better than other blood. I believe that Cummings held that view, his father-in-law does so with knobs on. I once wrote something called Stratification, that’s the name of the game. I must have another look at it. I believe that we have a Galtonian Government in which the self-labelled patricians continue to look down upon the plebeians.

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WORD

Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

thewordmedia.org

MORE LEGENDS AND MYTHS AROUND THE THREE VERS

The Rolling Stones

he last issue of this column described the three incarnations of the famous Rolling Stones. These were: the Brian Jones era; the Mick Taylor era; the Ron Wood era. There was an era pre-fame when a keyboardist was removed from the band because his hair was too short and his head allegedly the wrong shape; he continued

nevertheless, just not as a member.

Sometime in the third era the band lost Bill Wyman and gained someone who stands in the shadows and plays the low notes. Some bands pay their bass players less than everyone else; others just mistreat them in various other ways.

Thus the three versions of the Stones revolve not around the ‘Glimmer Twins’ – Mick Jagger and Keith (Keef) Richards, but the lead guitarists they used and abused. Bill Wyman, who left in 1993, paid tribute to the genius that was Brian Jones, saying that he formed them, told them what to play, got them gigs, and occasionally slept with the bass player’s girlfriend (or was it just

the once? Oh, that’s OK then.) Without Jones they’d still be a pub band in Dartford; there are better pub bands, and in Dartford! Mick Taylor was allowed to leave when he finally spoke to someone. What he said was, “I’d like to leave.” Replacement Ron Wood struck up rapport with the other guitar player (Keef.)

Leading left voices begin their fight back

In the week Jeremy Corbyn is to take his first steps in the High Court with the Starmer party over his suspension, former London Mayor Ken Livingstone and Rossendale

borough councillor Pam Bromley, both named in last year’s Equality and Human Rights Commission report into alleged antisemitism in the Labour Party, are challenging the Report’s findings against them via judicial review. In its long-delayed and controversial report last October the EHRC found that Livingstone and Bromley had ‘contributed’ to alleged ‘unlawful harassment related to Jewish race and religion’ by the Labour Party. and

Livingstone Bromley

rejected the findings and the legal analysis underpinning them, which they believe is flawed. The pair have assembled a top legal team to address the findings against them and are crowdfunding £40,000 to cover initial costs.

will address the EHRC’s legal analysis relating to the statutory test for harassment under the Equality Act 2010 and freedom of expression under Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The pair’s case will focus on the sections of the EHRC report relating to them - including concerns about their right to freedom of expression which could lead to sections of the current report being substantially revised.

Speaking about his decision to launch the judicial review, Livingstone said: The EHRC’s investigation into the Labour Party was a politically-motivated attack aimed at derailing Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. The Commission cobbled together a half-baked case against me, justified by a flawed legal analysis.

Their call for the court review

This judicial review will be a

vital step in correcting the record and in fighting back against a McCarthyite smear campaign which has been waged against the British Left over the past five years. Bromley added: The EHRC Report and its dubious legal analysis will have knock-on effects for freedom of expression. The right of pro-Palestine campaigners to criticise the State of Israel and its apartheid policies is being actively suppressed. This judicial review will not only help to clear mine and Ken’s names, it will ensure that the EHRC Report can’t be used as a tool to bludgeon activists who dare to speak up for Palestinians.

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POLITICS AND EVENTS

Mid January 2021

THE

WORD

SIONS OF THE STONES DONALD TRUMP’S BOOK REVIEW

(Part 2) Throughout it all there has been Stone-aged Charlie Watts on drums, famous for his terrifying smile and for almost throwing Mick Jagger out of an upstairs window when he referred to him as “my drummer.” Keef saved him by grabbing Mick’s jacket; tradition has it that the jacket was actually Keef’s and he didn’t want to see it ruined by the fall. This entire story might be

a fabrication but Legends are part of the Myth as far as the Stones are concerned. Oh, yeah; they produced some great singles and about three decent albums. Producer and drummer Jimmy Miller comes to mind as being responsible for their best work, in my humungous opinion. Seymour Griffiths

The legal challenge is being I have also considered what supported by the Left Legal the speculation about my Fighting Fund, a central fund to leadership does to our ability assist activists, protesters and to get Labour’s message across. whistleblowers. The Fighting This has become a distraction. Fund was established at the end of 2019 by former Labour However, Labour sources MP Chris Williamson close to Leonard from the costs he won had a one-word Jeremy after his High Court answer when Corbyn to take victory against the asked what had party. triggered him his first steps in the High Court to choose this Just as Ken moment to go: with the and Pat launched “Starmer.” After Starmer their fight back weathering party left Scottish Labour months of sniping leader Richard Leonard and sabotage by the has quit as leader saying: I Labour right, Leonard have thought long and hard has decided that there is over the Christmas period no prospect of anything about what this crisis means, improving in the party and the approach Scottish under the UK party’s “new Labour takes to help tackle it. management”.

Hi readers, I’m bigly into books and as I’m banned from social media and even Republicans are refusing to obey my authoritye. The office library is full of books, I usually love to apart wisdom on Twitter in there, all that knowledge I don’t need just sitting there on the shelf. Of course some are outdated, the goddam dictionary doesn’t even have an entry for ‘covfefe’. There’s a Bible of course, big fan of the Bible, but who the hell reads it at home? Just trust your Preacher to translate 2000 year old doctrines into guidance on Immigrants, lynching’s, Assault Rifle ownership and paramilitary ‘self defence’ against Antifas. I met the Pope, big fan of mine, very cool guy, you won’t find a bigger expert on the Christianity and it’s electoral importance. Now one bit of my genius is giving quotes. Many, many quotes. Like on Twitter here’s my favourites:“Well, you know, I love to read. Actually, I’m looking at a book, I’m reading a book, I’m trying to get started.” “I’ve read hundreds of books about China over the decades. I know the Chinese. I’ve made a lot of money with the Chinese. I understand the Chinese mind.” “I read passages, I read

areas, chapters, I don’t have the time. When was the last time I watched a baseball game? I’m watching you [Megyn Kelly] all the time.” “My people keep telling me I shouldn’t write letters like this to critics. The way I see it, critics get to say what they want to about my work, so why shouldn’t I be able to say what I want to about theirs?” “They don’t write good. They have people over there, like Maggie Haberman and others, they don’t—they don’t write good. They don’t know how to write good.” – Speaking to Sean Hannity. “It really doesn’t matter what they write as long as you’ve got a young and beautiful piece of ass.” “I like a lot of books. I like reading books. I don’t have the time to read very much now in terms of the books, but I like reading them.” [A business executive warning against China] said, “I’d like to send you a report.” He said, “I’d love to be able to send you”—oh boy, he’s got a lengthy report, hundreds of pages. . . . I said, “Do me a favor: Don’t send me a report. Send me, like, three pages.” “I know words. I have the best words.”

WORD

So many books on my shelves, here’s a few I may read: Win! by U. Lose Danger! by Luke Out Cry Wolf by Al Armist Gambling by Monty Carlos Mensa Man by Gene Yuss Hypnotism by N. Tranced Tug of War by Paul Hard Beekeeping by A. P. Arry Good Works by Ben Evolent Leo Tolstoy by Warren Peace Stop Arguing by Xavier Breath Military Rule by Marshall Law The Yellow River, by I. P. Freely My Lost Causes by Noah Veil Irish Flooring by Lynn O’Leum Highway Travel by Dusty Rhodes Ship Mysteries by Marie Celeste I Hate the Sun by Gladys Knight It’s a Holdup! by Nick R. Elastic Mexican Revenge by Monty Zuma I Didn’t Do It! by Ivan Alibi Life in Chicago by Wendy City Desert Crossing by I. Rhoda Camel Webster’s Words by Dick Shunnary Winning the Race by Vic Tree I Need Insurance by Justin Case Breaking the Law by Kermit A. Krime Good Housekeeping by Lottie Dust I Love Mathematics by Adam Up Unsolved Mysteries by N. Igma I Lived in Detroit by Helen Earth String Instruments by Viola Player The Housing Problem by Rufus Quick More for Your Money by Max Amize Assault with Battery by Eva Ready And the Other People by Allan Sundry Clothes for Germ Kings by Mike Robes Tyrant of the Potatoes by Dick Tater Military Defeats by Major Disaster and General Mayhem Judging Fast Food by Warren Berger Exotic Irish Plants by Phil O’Dendron Musical Gunfighters by The Okay Chorale Flogging in the Army by Corporal Punishment Errors and Accidents by Miss Takes and Miss Haps French Overpopulation by Francis Crowded How to Tour the Prison by Robin Steele The Industrial Revolution by Otto Mattick Ecclesiastical Infractions by Cardinal Sin Think Big And Kick Ass by Donald Trump. So many books, so little time!!!!

THE

WORD

Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

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JUST HOW DEEP DOES ZUCKERBERG HAVE HIS CLAWS IN YOU?

SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE MANIPULATION

hat was the first word that entered your head when you read the headline? Was it Facebook? Internet surveillance. Subliminal Cues. Every action logged. Growth Hacking. How long you stop to look at a picture. What you like, and who you talk to. Targeted Advertising. Manipulation Engine. Step 1 - Engagement, Step 2 Growth, Step 3 - Advertising. #Hashtag. Fake News. Truth. Lie. Divide and conquer. Civil War. Ultimately, the wide-scale manipulation of YOU at a subtle level whereby you won’t even know that it’s even happening. But it is happening. And the majority of you don’t... Science fiction, or fact? Let’s put this another way. Do you check your phone before you pee in the morning, or whilst you’re peeing? Do you drop your toast butter side down when you’re trying to see how many likes you got for your last post on Facebook, and then curse and fly into a frenzy because you accidentally deleted the post itself trying to stop your toast falling? When was the last time you tried to engage someone whilst they were on their phone? What were they doing on their phone when you tried to engage them? Again, was it Facebook? Did they react aggressively to the intrusion? And considering the fact that the only two industries that refer to their customers as ‘Users’ are drug dealers and software and social media developers, would you consider yourself an addict? Addict. That’s a strong word, isn’t it? But the reality is that you very probably are an addict, which you can verify to yourself by way of one simple experiment, which goes something like this.

If you’re not paying for the product, then you ARE the product’. Does that statement make you think at all? Does it make you question your reality or your reason for living, or why you’re even here? 1. Agree a time period. Let’s say 24 Hours to begin with. Should be easy, shouldn’t it? 2. Switch off your phone and all of the internet connected devices that you use. 3. Don’t switch any of them back on again for 24 Hours. The ENTIRE 24 Hours. How many of you felt panic when you got to point 2? How many felt physically sick at point 3? Could you actually do it? NO? Then the chances are you’re most assuredly an addict. Have any of you watched the Netflix series Black Mirror, or indeed the very focus and raison d’etre for this particular article, the Netflix docudrama, Social Dilemma? If you haven’t then perhaps you really should look away from your mobiles and tablets, just for a short while at least, IF

indeed you can, and take a long hard look at what IS happening right now, and what could conceivably be happening to you in the very near future. Now, I’m not saying that the internet is all bad, indeed it is a wonderful tool for learning and connecting people together. But there is this other side to it that is nefarious and anything but wholesome. And you really need to know about this... We’re not even talking about the Dark Web here, but it is nonetheless a side of the internet that people are using against you, to steer you, manipulate you, and control you. Facebook, Twitter, Google and a whole host of other social media giants are right now conspiring against you on a second to second basis, using complex algorithms designed to

draw you in, corral you, and then stealthily use you to generate income for them in a manner by which you have just become the commodity. A commodity to be bought and then sold on over and over again, as and when they wish to do so, and all without you even realising that they’re passing you around like a lucrative little bargaining revenue chip. But of course all of this is really nothing new. Granted it has evolved to a point where even those that created it are admittedly afraid of their Frankenstein, but the precursors were there all along through government sponsored programs such as MK-ULTRA, MK-NAOMI in the 80s and 90s onwards, Silent Sound Spread Spectrum (SSSS), which uses something that each and every one of us has in our own homes, right now – the ubiquitous and seemingly innocuous, HDTV signal.

Is this all just conspiratorial rubbish or something we should be taking seriously? And considering the fact that the governments of the world have already admitted that these things were, and are real, and that the people responsible for the new generation of social media mind-control won’t let their own families access social media because they fear it, is this something that we should genuinely fear also? Scary stuff, uh? Is it all scary enough for you to want to research further though? And therein, as is always the case, is the $64 Million Dollar question. Will you dive in and uncover the web of deceit that is being weaved all around you, or will you just shrug your shoulders and stay asleep? Indeed, will you take the Red pill, or the Blue? As always, the choice is yours... Or is it?

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Mid January 2021

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Mad Madge Talks Across Oceans Of Time FROM BEYOND THE WALL OF LOST SPIRITS, LOOSED TEMPORARILY FROM THE HORRORS OF ETERNAL TORMENT, AUNTIE MAGGIE ANSWERS YOUR LETTERS. A VERY MAGGIE CHRISTMAS

reetings from the Slough Of Despond that is my eternal torment. I see that dumpy duffer Boris has plunged England into another lockdown, at the forefront of copying Scotland and Wales, several weeks later. After all we know science works differently in the provinces. Who could have predicted that a highly infectious disease would increase its spread when schoolkids mix with their friends and relations. Anyway, on with your letters.... DEAR Margaret Thatcher I hate the Labour party and all it stands for. What can I do to destroy it? Keith Starmer

Sir Keef, you seem to have that well and truly covered. I especially admire your single-minded willingness to support absolutely everything that the other Tories say. Such loyalty to the cause will see your career in the establishment go on for many a year. Having alienated all the socialists you might want to rebrand your party, maybe veer towards nationalism and put your message on a Union Jack. That should do it. Dearest daughter of the evil undead Tis a plague and no mistake walks in the unhallowed ground of our Kingdom. The unruly peasants are breaking our divine law and they are revolting (so Boris told me.) Thou who art a Thatcher be

thus warned; they art led by another repairer of broken roofs – a Tyler no less. How can I crush these unruly scum and show them that peasants they shall remain? Richard Plantagenet, the second of that name. The times change but the same old problems just keep cropping up don’t they. Same Old Shit, Different Century. Have you thought of accusing Wat Tyler of racial prejudice against Hebrews? That can often work. Try a three point edict such as ‘Stayeth in thy Hovel, Administer Leeches, Die in your 30’s!’

me in for a tofu and cabbage sandwich. Any advice? Piers from London It sounds like your Vegan brother is a bit of a Leftist zealot, probably obsessed with Peace and Justice. I know Christmas is all about giving and sharing, but it’s also about unfettered spending and profit, something your Bro is probably opposed to, hence his misanthropic response. That and social distancing and mask wearing, which of course you keep getting arrested for disagreeing with. Keep an eye on the weather old sausage.

Dear Evil one I went round to knock for my little Brother on Xmas day. I even took Father Xmas with me. He didn’t even invite

Dear Maggie Thanks for letting me talk to you in this wonderful séance. All our people are here: Boris, Tony, Maggie Hodge, Keith Starmer, Bibi,

ETC. How can I make oodles of money? Angela Rayner, deputy leader of the Labour party. PS. I was a single parent at the age of 12 Well you are certainly mixing in the right circles now. Have you considered selling your soul to the Devil, I’m sure those Corbynite Trots would say you already have, but you can actually do it for real. In the meantime, to further your Red Tory career you might want to adapt your appearance a bit from your Council House Chic of Potnoodle stained Leggings and Dr Martens Boots. Try a Laura Ashley print dress or a knitted twin set and a tweed skirt. Wear slutty animal print stilettos, it worked for Theresa, it’ll work for you.

THE

WORD

Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

thewordmedia.org

BIZARRE NEWS What? A Dump!

Peterborough has been voted the worst place to live in the UK, closely followed by Huddersfield and Liverpool. The list of Britain’s top 50 worst towns was compiled by the comedy website I Live Here, which says of Peterborough: “You feel totally isolated from the rest of the world and life in general, as though everything else is going on and you’re not part of it as you’re stuck in this dump.” Student Zooms In

A student says she was “mortified” when she noticed during an online interview that her Zoom username was “Quiztina Aguilera”. Maisie Smith was midway through being interviewed for a dream spot at the University of Manchester when she spotted that her username was still set as it had been for an online quiz some time earlier. However, she still got an offer to take her place at the university in September.

UK next year, unaccompanied by wife Meghan. After throwing asparagus into the air, Jemima Packington, 64, the world’s only asparamancer, said: “What we have here, very interesting, is the letter H. We have two spears plus a crossbar here. I don’t see any M at all whatsoever. I see no letter M but I do see letter H coming into the fold.”

girlfriend. Dale McLaughlan, 28, was sentenced to four weeks in prison for the 25-mile journey from Scotland’s Isle of Whithorn to the Isle of Man, after his trip was found to break coronavirus rules. “The craziest thing is he can’t even swim,” said a relative, adding that he’s a “nice lad but thick as a brick”

Blow Up Trump

A professor has argued that older people should use sex robots. Professor Nancy Jecker of the University of Washington School of Medicine believes the dishy droids could be used by the elderly to fight “impaired sexual functioning”. Speaking to the Tri-Cities Area Journal of Business, she said: “I’m calling on industry to market themselves to an older clientele, a clientele that has age-related impairment of sexual function.”

Atlantic City is auctioning the chance to dynamite a casino formerly owned by Donald Trump. The Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City went bankrupt and shut in 2014. A bidding process will determine who gets the right to hit the button that will destroy the 39-floor casino, with proceeds going to charity. The mayor said his office has already been “bombarded” with phone calls about the auction.

Aged To Get Sexbots

1,000 miles bottle message

A couple in North Carolina say they found a message in a bottle that traveled over 1,000 miles from Prince Edward Island, Canada. Ann and Roy Huntley said they were walking on the beach in Ocracoke when they found a

glass bottle with a note inside. Another message in a bottle launched from Canada was found on a beach in Ireland. Jailed Jetskier

A Scotsman has been jailed for riding a jet ski across the Irish Sea to spend some time with his

Asparagus Royal News

A psychic who uses asparagus to see into the future has predicted that Prince Harry will return the

Bojo’s Diary 3rd Jan. Woke up with a splitting hangover on a bench on the Embankment. Last thing I remember was having a cheeky drink sitting with Carrie and little Thingy in front of Jools Hootenanny on New Year’s Eve. Must have got a touch carried away, celebrating our new Sovereignty and deregulated financial standards, now we’ve left the EU. Think I’ll give ‘Dry January’ a go. 4th Jan. Spent the day having Photos taken in a

school, whilst insisting that schools were 100% safe and will absolutely not be closing. 5th Jan. Put the country in lockdown and closed all the schools. Couldn’t be arsed coming up with another 3 point catch phrase so just revived the old ‘Stay Home ~ Protect The NHS ~ Save Lives’ stickers on the lecturn. Waste not want not. 6th Jan. Had to ‘debate’ the new lockdown in House of Commons today, 24 hours

after it came into force. Usual stream of bleating about details from the opposition, gave the usual whiffwhaff speech, barely bothered to answer a single question, then left for a boozy lunch in the Members bar. ‘Dry January’ over. Left Gavlar Williamson to add

some well thought out excuses to do with State Education, as if that matters. 7th Jan. Got a nanny and some of their Mother’s to play with my children, watched it on Zoom, such a joy to participate

in the upbringing of 6 or 7 of my kids. 8th Jan. Roman Emperor Servius Sulpicius Galba was assassinated by the Praetorian guard in the Roman Forum. He had succeeded Emperor Nero. Must remember to sack Gove. Carpe Diem and all that. 9th Jan. Played piggy in the middle with Dodgy Dave Cameron. I don’t think the pig enjoyed it. ‘Titter Ye Not’, ‘Ooh Behave’ and ‘Please Yourself’ etc.

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POLITICS AND EVENTS

Mid January 2021

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Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

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Hope and Good News WOMEN WHO MADE A DIFFERENCE - KICK

After 2020 we are all in need of more ‘H ope and Good News’. Let us start with the hope that the Oxford vaccine for Covid 19 becomes widely available to fight the pandemic.

and fruits of the desert. Reliance on processed foods had seen a 30% increase in obesity and the move to use more ‘wild’ food should prove beneficial to health and the local economy.

Let us hope that more autocratic leaders like Donald Trump lose their grip on power. Benjamin Netanyahu has been forced into fighting yet another election ending hopefully both his and joint President in waiting Bennie Gantz grip on power to be ended. Signs are that both their parties are losing public support.

Z i m b a b w e : Environmentalists have pushed the government to ban coal mining in all their national parks. Chinese firms had been given a licence to explore for coal in Hwange, the countries largest reserve, home to 40,000 elephants and the endangered black rhino.

When a few of these despots go let us pray others fall like a deck of cards! Leaders in Turkey, Indonesia, Brazil and India may be secure for now, but one can only hope the political death of Trump signals a change for the better in other countries. His ‘waning star’ has seen a glimmer of true democracy in parts of Latin America emerging as exemplified by the election of MAS (Movement for Socialism) candidate Luis Arc Catacora as President to continue the economic progress made by Evo Morales in Bolivia.

Singapore: Plans have been made to plant one million trees by 2030. Al;so a new park is planned in the north of the island to connect green spaces and be a haven for migratory birds and native animal species. Over the last 6 decades 90% of mangrove forest has been lost. Now the park will be a ten minute walk for most residents.

Mexico: The loss of tourism, the mainstay of the economy, in Real de Catorce in a mountainous part of the country has seen the people return to more sustainable living. Often using ancestral knowledge people have been harvesting cacti, flowers

London: After a decade of campaigning cleaners have won the right to be recognised as direct employees of the University of London. Represented by the Independent Workers of Great Britain these cleaners were contractors for private companies. They now enjoy the same rights of other workers brought in house by the university earlier in 2020. The scourge of outsourcing in retreat we hope!

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CLAUDIA JO

A Trinidad and Tobago-born journalist and activist, Jones is perhaps best remembered for founding the UK’s first major black newspaper, West Indian Gazette, and her work in laying the groundwork for the now world famous Notting Hill carnival.

ones was born Claudia Vera Cumberbatch on 21 February 1915 in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, though at eight years of age she and her family emigrated to New York City’s Harlem. Her potential for activism and philanthropy were quickly realised when she won the Theodore Roosevelt Award for Good Citizenship at her junior high school. The family were poor so on graduation she took a job in a laundry while also writing a column called Claudia Comments for a Harlem journal on the side. In 1936, she joined the Young Communist League USA and, passionate about writing, contributed to and led a variety of communist publications as a young adult. Then in 1937 she became a member of the editorial staff of the Daily Worker. When the Young Communist League became American Youth for Democracy during World

War II, Jones became editor of its monthly journal, Spotlight. She was first arrested and sentenced to the first of four terms of imprisonment for her political activities in 1948. She was ordered to be deported in 1950 and in 1951, and once again in prison, she suffered her first heart attack aged only 36. After the war, Jones became executive secretary of the Women’s National Commission, secretary for the Women’s Commission of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA), and in 1952 took the same position at the National Peace Council. Jones was an outspoken advocate of civil rights, gender equality, and decolonisation, often speaking at public gatherings to work towards the liberation of black women from discrimination faced through classism, racism and sexism. In 1951 she was convicted of un-American activities. In 1955 she served her final term

of imprisonment before being deported to Trinidad and Tobago, but as the colonial governor banned her the United Kingdom agreed to allow her in on humanitarian grounds Transplanting her impassioned fight against racial injustice to the other side of the Atlantic, Jones turned her attention to issues facing London’s West Indian immigrant community. One of Jones’s best remembered achievements came in 1958, when she founded and served as the editor in chief for the West Indian Gazette and Afro-Asian Caribbean News - the UK’s first major black newspaper. Through its global news coverage, the Gazette aimed to unify the black community in the worldwide battle against discrimination, and provided a platform for Jones to organise the country’s first Caribbean carnival in 1959. The carnival was organised

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KED OUT OF THE US AND BARRED FROM TRINIDAD SHE CAME HERE

ONES in response to the Notting Hill race riots of 1958 as a way to “wash the taste of Notting Hill out of our mouths”. It led to today’s annual celebration of Caribbean culture, the Notting Hill Carnival.

Jones died at the young age of 49 on Christmas Day 1964 a heart attack due to a combination of heart disease and the tuberculosis she had suffered as a child. Her funeral was a large and political ceremony, with her burial plot in Highgate Cemetery, North London, selected to be that located to the left of her hero, Karl Marx’s tomb. Four months later, the West Indian Gazette closed. She had dedicated her life to the fight against racial discrimination and oppression, relentlessly championing issues such as civil rights and gender equality.

248. Here is a crossword puzzle that uses mathematical terms. Have fun using the clues to fill in the grids with the appropriate terms from the word boxes.

Woman! This extract shows why the American Government was keen to deport her: “The bourgeoisie is fearful of the militancy of the Negro woman, and for good reason. The capitalists know, far better than many progressives seem to know, that once Negro women begin to take action, the militancy of the whole Negro people, and thus of the antiimperialist coalition, is greatly enhanced. Historically, the Negro woman has been the guardian, the protector, of the Negro family... As mother, as Negro, and as worker, the Negro woman fights against the wiping out of the Negro family, against the Jim Crow ghetto existence which destroys the health, morale, and very life of millions of her sisters, brothers, and children.

Here in Britain she was instrumental in helping organise the African-Caribbean community to access housing, education and employment. She also helped to form a movement towards equal rights working with many others, including her lifelong mentor Paul Robeson.

Viewed in this light, it is not accidental that the American bourgeoisie has intensified its oppression, not only of the Negro people in general, but of Negro women in particular. Nothing so exposes the drive to fascization in the nation as the callous attitude which the bourgeoisie displays and cultivates toward Negro women.”

Her best known piece of writing was An End to the Neglect of the Problems of the Negro

In August 2008, a blue plaque was unveiled on the corner of Tavistock Road

and Portobello Road, West London, commemorating Claudia Jones as the “Mother of Caribbean Carnival in Britain”.

In October Britain’s Mail commemorated

2008, Royal Jones

with a special postage stamp. (enclosed) Jones is named on the list of 100 Great Black Britons

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POLITICS AND EVENTS

Vegan recipes

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Cooking with Chris Williamson

VEGAN YORKSHIRE PUDDINGS

lot of people who go vegan say they miss some of the food they used to enjoy before giving up animal products. One of the things I used to like as kid was my Mam’s Yorkshire Pudding, something I’d not eaten for nearly 45 years. I was therefore delighted to come across this recipe recently for vegan Yorkshire pudding! The trick is to use the juice from tins of chickpeas, (aquafaba) as a substitute for eggs. It works really well and can be used as an egg substitute for other recipes too. Ingredients 7½tsp sunflower oil 40g self-raising flour 40g gram flour 40g cornflour ½ tsp baking powder ½ tsp xanthan gum ¼ tsp kala namak (black salt) Pinch fine sea salt a pinch 205g aquafaba 205g (the soaking water from 1-1 ½ tins of chickpeas)

Method STEP 1 Heat the oven to 240°C/fan or 220°C/gas 9. Put 1½ tsp of oil into each of five of the holes of a deep sixhole muffin tin. Swirl the tin to make sure the sides of each hole are oiled. Put on to a sturdy metal baking sheet and into the top of the oven for 15 minutes.

STEP 2 Put all of the remaining ingredients into a highspeed blender along with 125ml of water. Blend until completely smooth. STEP 3 After 15 minutes, carefully remove the tin and baking sheet from the oven. Working quickly, pour the batter in a thin, constant

stream, evenly filling the five holes (pour the batter in a circular motion onto the sides of the holes – this traps a little well of oil in the centre which helps to form the hole in the middle). Swiftly return the tin to the oven. STEP 4 Bake for 20 minutes, then remove the tin from the

oven. Carefully remove each pudding and put on a separate baking tray. Return them to the oven for a further 5 minutes to crisp up. Remove from the oven and sit for 5 minutes (this will let the steam evaporate, resulting in a crispier pudding). Serve with your favourite vegan roast, veg and gravy, if you like. Enjoy!

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BEST OF THE WEB Russian opposition figure Navalny detained at

passport control after returning to Moscow following almost five months in Germany. Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny has been detained by police at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport after returning from Germany, where he had been recovering following an alleged poisoning attempt l a s t

summer. Navalny and his wife Yulia left the plane together on Sunday evening with the rest of the passengers and drove to the terminal in a bus. The activist was arrested at the immigration desk. Russia’s prison authority has confirmed the detention. Navalny, who was wanted for breaching the terms of his probation from a previous criminal case, will remain in custody until the court rules on pre-trial restrictions against him, it said. Navalny’s plane touched down at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport, having been diverted from Vnukovo Airport where a large crowd of his supporters had gathered. There were minor scuffles with police and several arrests at the latter location. His close associates Lyubov Sobol and Ruslan Shaveddinov were among those held. Austria has introduced tighter rules on social distancing and mask-wearing, with a nationwide lockdown extended until February 7. Life will hopefully return to normal in the summer, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz has said.

The new rules “don’t make anyone happy and are anything but popular, yet they are necessary, even if everyone is already fed up,” Kurz said on Sunday. Beginning January 25, Austrians will have to wear respirator-type FFP2 masks in supermarkets, pharmacies, gas stations, and on public transport. The FFP2s offer better protection against airborne infections than cheaper, single-use surgical masks. The FFP2 masks, which are currently sold in pharmacies, will be available at a “really low” price in supermarkets, according to Health Minister Rudolf Anschober. Anti-epidemic authorities

in north China’s Tianjin Municipality are tracing close contacts with ice cream contaminated with the coronavirus after three samples tested positive for the virus. All of the products produced by Tianjin Daqiaodao Food Company has been sealed and contained after the company sent the samples to the municipal centre for disease control on Tuesday and Wednesday,

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which later tested positive for the virus. P r e l i m i n a r y e p i d e m i o l o g i c a l investigations show that the company produced the batch of ice cream using raw materials including milk powder imported from New Zealand and whey powder imported from Ukraine. The US government has carried out the 13th and final federal execution under President Donald Trump’s administration, just days before President-elect Joe Biden takes office with a promise to try to end the death penalty. Dustin Higgs, 48, was pronounced dead at 1.23am eastern time, the federal Bureau of Prisons said in a statement. Five hours after he was set to be executed, the US Supreme Court’s conservative majority cleared the way for lethal injections to proceed, overturning a stay ordered by a federal appeals court. Higgs was convicted and sentenced to death in 2001 for overseeing the kidnapping and murder of three women on a federal wildlife reserve in Maryland in 1996: Tanji Jackson, Tamika Black and Mishann Chinn.

THE We are a non-profit making cooperative but still have our outgoing costs such as design, website hosting and software. Please help us maintain this left wing tabloid by going to our website at www. thewordmedia.org and subscribing. By joining together let us all fight back against the rich and powerful.

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Music producer and convicted murderer Phil Spector dies aged 81 Phil Spector, who produced many of pop music’s biggest hits, has reportedly died from Covid-19 related complications at the age of 81. He was serving a prison sentence for murder. Spector was diagnosed with the coronavirus disease four weeks ago and was transferred from prison to hospital. TMZ is reporting that he recovered enough to return

to jail but he relapsed and struggled with breathing and returned to a hospital where he died Saturday. The 81-year-old was serving a 19 years-to-life sentence for the 2003 murder of actress Lana Clarkson. He was convicted in 2009, six years after Clarkson was shot dead at his home. The California Department of

Corrections and Rehabilitation said Spector died of natural causes at an outside hospital, and that his official cause of death will be determined by the medical examiner in the San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office. Spector carved out an extraordinary music career, winning acclaim as a record producer, musician and song-

writer. He developed the hugely influential music production formula known as the Wall of Sound. Spector produced 20 top 40 hits between 1961 and 1965 and went on to work with the Beatles, the Righteous Brothers and Ike and Tina Turner. He also influenced artists ranging from the Beach Boys to Bruce Springsteen.

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bout the author – Ex Goldman Sachs banker who uses her knowledge of the international money markets and central banks to write an expose of how, following the 2007/8 crash, the central banks of the world’s leading economies colluded with, and ultimately shaped Government thinking which affected billions of people around the world. The book is broken down into 6 chapters, each critiquing and exposing individual central banks’ actions which transferred wealth from taxpayers to the speculators on the money markets, all underpinned by the US Federal Banks’ manipulation and intimidation.

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It explores the links between the main players and the ‘old boys’ network which ensures that those responsible are able to move seamlessly between the major financial institutions that run the worlds economies. The chapter headings are: l Mexico l Brazil l China l Japan l Europe 1 l Europe 2 Throughout the book the dominance of the US and the helplessness of the emerging countries to fight their influence is evident. Only China shows resilience and forges its own path as best it can towards establishing their currency as a major international player

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on the money scene. It gives an in depth view of how the Fed alienated and continues to alienate and control not only emerging economies worldwide but also the major ones as well. The section on China is particularly interesting as it documents their rise to economic power and influence by using their brand of monetary policy to invest in other countries to gain global influence and ultimately enhance their economic power, not only with emerging economies but also with some of the US’s closest trading partners. It is also interesting to see how they refuse to play the Fed’s game unless it is in their interest to do so and thus helping them to establish their own currency as a major force on the world economic stage. The recurring theme through the whole book is the effect that the scheming and chicanery by the money men has on the ordinary people of the countries involved. The terminology used by the bankers and government hier-

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MANCHESTER BUS STRIKE We have just been notified that despite numerous meetings and massive concessions from the drivers the company Go North West will not move from its original position. And this morning they have issued notice to fire and rehire its KEY WORKER drivers More information will be relayed as and when we get it. archy is cold and shows no empathy towards the billions of people their actions affect – they talk in terms of ‘efficiency savings’ and ‘rationalisation’ for austerity, job cuts and unemployment.

ing a trade war with China in the hope of destabilising their increasing rise in trade throughout the world and in particular their currency which is becoming a major threat to the US dollar.

Having finished the book, I was left with a better understanding of the result of their methods and collusion namely - the reasons for Brexit, Bolsanaro, Trump and the disenchantment throughout other nations especially the emerging nations for whom the only solace to a large extent was investment by China in large infrastructure projects.

It’s a very good read, however if you do not have some background in finance you could find that some of the terminology could be a little baffling. There is however, a lengthy glossary (some 100 pages!) you can refer to which helps explain terminology etc.

It also gave me a better understanding of why Trump and his government are openly encourag-

I do strongly recommend the book as it not only confirms what we knew about the deception of the last decade, but explains it in more detail and lays it out in all its brazen, almost criminal hypocrisy.

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CORBYN’S OPTION “C” – RED LABOUR RED LABOUR V RIGHTISTS IN 50+ SAFE LABOUR CONSTITUENCIES

There are over 10,000 Corbyn supporters in London who have already left the Labour Party. If only 1,000 work for Red Labour in Holborn & St Pancras, that will be more than enough to get Corbyn’s message to everyone

n Starmer’s world view there is no benefit to Labour in having Jeremy Corbyn as a Labour MP. There is no hope of Corbyn’s CLP deselecting Corbyn. The best Starmer can do is to expel or suspend Jeremy Corbyn just as a General Election is called. The reasons can be spurious because the purpose is only to prevent Corbyn standing as a Labour MP. There will not be time for Islington North CLP to choose another Leftist. The NEC will impose a candidate, who will

There are 66 constituencies where Labour won more than 60% of the vote in 2019.

not be a Leftist. Corbyn’s Option “A” is to accept the situation gracefully. Noone believes that Jeremy Corbyn would just accept the situation. Option B is to stand as Red Labour in Islington North. The 2019 General Election results were Corbyn 34,603, LD 8,415, Con 5,483, Green 4,326, Others 978. There is no danger

of the seat being lost to the LDs. If the vote splits exactly evenly, both candidates have 17,301 votes - more than LD and Conservatives put together. Jeremy Corbyn would be reluctant to expose all his friends to the certainty of expulsion from the Labour Party. Option “C” is to stand in Holborn & St Pancras constituency against Keir Starmer. The results were Starmer 36,641, Con 8,878, LD 7,314, Green 2,746, Brexit 1,032 Others 175. Again, one of

the Labour candidates will win. Should Corbyn win, it will demonstrate that Labour’s core vote prefers Corbyn to Starmer. There are over 10,000 Corbyn supporters in London who have already left the Labour Party. If only 1,000 work for Red Labour in Holborn & St Pancras, that will be more than enough to get Corbyn’s message to everyone. There are 66 constituencies where Labour won more than 60% of the vote in 2019. Some are held by Left MPs but many are not. If Red

Labour stood against Right wing Labour in these constituencies, Red Labour might do better than the Scottish Nationalists (currently 47 seats), creating a very interesting House of Commons after the next General Election. If Labour generally does poorly, then there will be a Red Labour opposition to fight the Tories. If Labour generally does well, then the Labour Party will only be able to form a Government with support from Red Labour. Is Starmer stupid enough to create this situation? It is a logical consequence of the path that Starmer is on.

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LABOUR HAS SOLD ITS SOUL FOR A FALSE CHANCE OF POWER

OUT-TORYING THE TORIES OVER COVID

ohnson’s inept crew has overseen the 88,500 Covid deaths in the UK, the worst in Europe, and Starmer and is party have done little or nothing to oppose it.

The Covid crisis has exposed Keir Starmer’s values clearly and cruelly. His failure to stand by working people at risk of their lives is unforgivable that the Tories’ underfunding of the NHS over a decade left the NHS weakened and understaffed, unable to deal with any pandemic.

In December Unison reported: STARMER “Before Covid On 15 DecemHAS MORE ber 2017 (after struck, the NHS OFTEN Exercise was known to SUPPORTED OR nus revealedCygthe be underfunded REMAINED NHS was neither and understaffed. SILENT equipped or ready Latest figures show to deal with any surthat there are now prise pandemic) the NHS 106,000 staff vacancies across the NHS in England, in- published an updated “NHS cluding more than 44,000 va- England pandemic influenza cancies in nursing. This marks operating framework”. an increase from a year ago. In the document stockpiles “Beneath this staffing cri- of PPE (Personal Protective sis is a chronic lack of govern- Equipment) is mentioned. ment funding, particularly the There is no discussion of the scrapping of training bursa- size of the PPE stockpile of ries. The result is that health PPE, just a statement that it workers are working over a exists. million hours a week of unIt was clear early on that paid overtime to help the NHS there was nowhere near cope with rising demand.” enough PPE. A good Labour Any decent Labour Leader Leader would have queried would have said repeatedly why there was not enough

PPE when the 2017 plan recognised that in a pandemic PPE would be needed. In the plan, ventilators are not mentioned at all. A good Leader would have asked why. Hundreds of NHS staff have given their lives in the fight against Covid-19 because of the shortage of suitable PPE. Many people who died might have lived had there been sufficient ventilators. The incompetence of the Tories has led to needless deaths. The Tories should have been crucified repeatedly. They have not, Starmer has more often supported or remained silent. Their fantasy “herd immunity” concept should have been hammered relentlessly as shouild Johnson’s ever changing mixed messages. In other countries there were effective lockdowns. Starmer should have been demanding hard lockdowns from the beginning. On 11 May 2020. at least 65 education staff had already died of Covid. Starmer’s letter of 18 May 2020 supporting reopening schools was a terrible error.

Exercise Cygnus revealed the NHS was neither equipped or ready to deal with any surprise pandemic

Then Starmer said on 16 August 2020 “My message to the Prime Minister: I don’t just want all children back at

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school next month, I expect them back at school. No ifs, no buts, no equivocation.” Covid cases have rocketed. Schools are having to close anyway. On the Andrew Marr show on 11 January Starmer was still calling for the schools to be re-opened without teachers being vaccinated even though the education unions were opposed. NHS workers and education workers will note the repeated failures of Keir Starmer’s Labour to even try to protect them.

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Celebrating “The Word”; 5 years of The Word Newspaper Questions 1. What is the SI unit of frequency? 2. Which noble gas, that occurs naturally, is radioactive? 3. Typically consisting of a stalk and an anther, what is the name given to the pollen-producing reproductive organ of a flower 4. Which chemical element,

with the atomic number 23, was discovered in 1801 and used in the chassis of Ford’s Model T? 5. Whose law is ometimes also known as the law of refraction? 6. Who was the first ever British Prime Minister with a science degree? 7. Which ‘father of science’ died one year before Sir Isaac Newton was born? 8. Which science deals with

the motion of projectiles? 9. John sees a flash of lightning and hears the thunder 5 seconds later - in miles, how far away from John is the storm? 10. In which American state was the first ever atom bomb test carried out? 11. In water it has a value of 72.8 millinewtons per meter at 20 degree centigrade - what are we talking about? 12. What soft brown com-

bustible sedimentary rock that is formed from naturally compressed peat is often referred to as brown coal? 13. What is the largest living species of lizard? 14. Which popular pet belongs to the biological family felidae? 15. How many hearts does an octopus have?

Questions 1. Most of Russia’s gas exports to Europe are sent by pipeline through which country? 2. What is a semiconductor device used to amplify and switch electronic signals and electrical power? 3. Which planet in the solar system is the hotest?

4. Pulmonary refers to which part of the human body? 5. Which law states ‘for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction’? (give a name and number) 6. Which country accounts for 70% of the world’s platinum production? 7. Whose law states that the force needed to extend a spring

by some distance is proportional to that distance? 8. What word in geology is formed from the Greek for ‘mountain’ and ‘origin’? 9. What has the chemical formula H2O2? 10. Who was the decibel named after? 11. What is the only rock that floats in water?

12. What word in mathematics is Latin for pebble? 13. What type of number has a real and imaginary part? 14. What elementary particle can be up, down, strange, charm, bottom, and top? 15. What is the chemical symbol for tungsten?

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Answers: 1. Ukraine 2. Transistor 3. Venus 4. Lungs 5. Newton’s Third Law 6. South Africa 7. Hooke’s Law 8. Orogeny 9. Hydrogen Peroxide 10. Alexander Graham Bell 11. Pumice 12. Calculus 13. Complex number 14. A quark 15. W Answers: 1. Hertz 2. Radon 3. Stamen 4. Vanadium 5. Snell’s Law 6. Margaret Thatcher 7. Galileo Galilei 8. Ballistics 9. 1 mile (the speed of sound is 343.2 metres per second or a mile in 4.7 seconds) 10. New Mexico 11. Surface tension 12. Lignite 13. Komodo dragon 14. Cats 15. Three

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ENJOYED BY TOP RANK PLAYERS AND NON-PLAYERS ALIKE

THE QUEEN’S GAMBIT IS A WINNER

One of the reasons why chess took off in the Soviet Union is that it is the supreme equal opportunities game - you don’t need a horse, skis or golf clubs to take part - and succeed. You don’t even need a chess set

he Cuban player Joese Raul Capablanca learnt how the pieces move at the age of four by simply by watching his father play in 1892. Within a short time he was regularly beating him and on his way to defeating Emanuel Lasker in their 14-game match for the 1921 world championship. Beth Harmon, the star of the Netflix series, The Queen’s Gambit, didn’t have a chess set either. She just wanders down to the basement of the orphanage where she is living, watches Mr Shaibell, the caretaker, going through some moves at a chessboard and learns how to play.

Within a short time she is winning her games against him easily, even though he is a good club player, and she beats the all-boys team at the nearby high school in a simultaneous display, to their horror.

The real Levenfish Attack In the film the Queen’s Gambit, orphan Beth Harmon is taught to play chess by the caretaker Mr Shaibel, who refers to the Levenfish attack. She had obviously reached a high standard by then.

If you haven’t seen The Queen’s Gambit make sure you do. It is a gem that will surely inspire more films exploring other aspects of chess.

Bobby Fischer, who won the world championship in 1972 and the less well known Lisa Lane who won the US women’s championship in 1959.

Judith Polgar, the Hungarian grandmaster who rose in the world rankings to No 8 in 2005 (and rarely played in womenonly events) is a fan, so is her sister Susan, who became women’s world champion.

Walter Tevis, author of the 1983 novel on which the film is based,(his other books include The Hustler and The Color of Money) was clearly a decent player but the script benefits from detailed advice on chess etiquette and culture provided by New York expert Bruce Pandolfini, and Garry Kasparov, the former world champion.

Susan, who lives in the US, believes the novel was inspired by the feats of the legendary American player

Sleeping Beauty fairy tale quality will make some professionals grimace

Levenfish vs Leontievich Rabinovich 1.e4c5 2.Nf3d6 3.d4Nf6 4.Nc3cxd4 5.Nxd4g6 6.f4Bg7 7.e5Ng4 8. Bb5+Kf8 9.h3Nh6 10.Be3Nc6 11.exd6Nxd4 12.Bxd4Qxd6 13.Bxg7+Kxg7 14.Qxd6exd6 15.O-O-O Rd8 16.Rd2Be6 17.Rhd1Nf5 18.g4Ne3 19.Re1a6 20.Rxe3axb5 21.Nxb5Rxa2 22.Rxd6Rxd6 23.Nxd6Ra1+ 24.Kd2Rf1 25.Nxb7Rxf4 26.Nc5Bd5 27.Nd3Rf1 28.b3Kh6 29.c4Bg2 30.Ke2Rb1 31. g5+Kg7 32.Kf2Bb7 33.b4Bc8 34.c5Bf5 35.c6h6 36.gxh6+Kxh6 37.c7Rb3 38.h4Rc3 39.Nc5Rc4 40.Re5Bg4 41.Re4Rc2+ 42.Ke3Bf5 43.Rf4Bc8 44.Rxf7Rc4 45.Rf4 1-0

The atmospherics in the series are spot on

The atmospherics in the series are spot on, whether it is the Kentucky state championship or an elite allplay-all in Moscow. It also deals with the apparent paradox that although the game is highly individualistic it is also imbued with a sense of community. This is exemplified in the final scene when Beth, fresh from her world champion victory, makes a point of leaving her limousine to play a game against one of the ordinary Russians meeting in a Moscow square to play. In other words, showing respect.

Grigory Levenfish, to give him his full name, was born in 1889 and died in 1961 and was awarded the grandmaster title in 1950 when the titles were introduced. He was joint winner of the Soviet championship in 1934 and won it outright in 1937 when he analysed the idea of the attack, which is essentially an antidote to the Dragon variation of the Sicilian defence. The line is characterised by the theoretical novelty f4 on move six for white. Levenfish was a top player with a nose for sharp tactics. In 1937 he drew a match with Mikhail Botvinnik, who later became world champion and is the model for Vasily Borgov in The Queen’s Gambit. In the course of that match he beat Botvinnik five times, which was an unheard of feat. His autobiography, which has now been translated, is called Soviet Outcast, and can be found on ebay and most other book outlets. In this game he employs the Levenfish attack with devastating effect (Pic of chessboard showing move 6 f4) https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1090707 pieces move six)

(game

Books: https://www.hive.co.uk/Product/Grigory-Levenfish/Soviet-Outcast/252 44775?wgu=10671_8622_16097011380034_ d3f385e116&wgexpiry=1765221137&utm_source=webgains&utm_ medium=affiliates&utm_campaign=8622 (£17.19) https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/313228553840 (£17.50) https://tales.as/soviet-outcast_grigory-levenfish_9781784830854 (£17.49)

There are of course a few quibbles. The moves are bashed out at a rate you would play a “bullet” or “blitz” game and the level and duration of study required at expert, let alone grandmaster level, is understated. Of course, as it is pitched primarily at a non-playing

audience some issues are fudged and glossed over giving it a Sleeping Beauty fairy tale quality that will make some professionals grimace. But the most interesting thing is that non-players have taken the film to their hearts as well as professionals.

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POLITICS AND EVENTS

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Book 5 Sudoku #1

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SUDOKU

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Intermediate Sudoku Puzzles by KrazyDad

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Mid January 2021

8 5

4 3 7 6 9

5 4

Sudoku #2

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2 7 2 3

4 3 8

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Fear is the tax that the conscience pays to guilt. -- Sewell

Sudoku #3

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Sudoku #4

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Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

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Patel’s home office messes up again and this time it is criminal Investigations could be compromised by the “accidental” loss of hundreds of thousands of police records, it has been claimed.

ore than 400,000 records were deleted from a national database due to ‘human error’, it emerged on Friday. Policing Minister Kit Malthouse said officers were ‘working at pace’ to recover the data and an initial assessment by police and the Home Office is there is ‘no threat to public safety’ as a result of the blunder. But an unnamed senior police officer told Sky News on Saturday that investigations could be compromised as detectives would be unable to cross-reference information. Speaking on Friday, Mr Malthouse admitted he was ‘not entirely sure as yet’ whether the Police National Computer (PNC) data loss would have an operational

impact on police work. While officials ‘have put in place contingency measures to allow the police to continue with their investigations that rely on the PNC’, he said, the policing minister failed to rule out that future cases could be jeopardised. He told reporters: ‘The police have a number of evidential routes that they can use in cases, and part of that does rely on the PNC. ‘Our job now over the next few days is to recover the data that was erroneously deleted, and to make sure that what remains on the computer is sound and can be used by police officers.

Mr Malthouse insisted steps had been taken to ensure the same mistake could not be made again. Human error had led to ‘defective code’ being introduced during ‘routine maintenance’ earlier in the week which deleted some records, he explained, adding that the incident is still under investigation. How much of the data can be recovered, if any, will be known later next week, he added. Meanwhile the Labour leader, Keir Starmer, called on Home Secretary Priti Patel to ‘take responsibility’ for the loss and said it was a ‘really serious situation’.

‘What we’ve said to those who are currently relying on PNC data for investigations is that once we’ve done that, they can re-run their searches and hopefully get the result that they need.’

Patel is the Minister who was sacked from the previous Tory Government, she had spoken to the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, in a meeting that Prime Minister, May did not know about and with no officials present. Thirteen meetings were held in the presence of Lord Polak, an experienced Tory lobbyist.

Operation Ore Operation Ore was a British police operation that commenced in 1999 following information received from US law enforcement, which was intended to prosecute thousands of users of a website reportedly featuring child pornography. It was the United Kingdom’s biggest ever computer crime investigation, leading to 7,250 suspects identified, 4,283 homes searched, 3,744 arrests, 1,848 charged, 1,451 convictions, 493 cautioned and 140 children removed from suspected dangerous situations. The British police were heavily criticised at the time for being slow off the mark to interview prominent people on the list so allowing them to destroy evidence. Many suspects were never interviewed at all. Perhaps now, with the “accidental” destruction of Police records, they never will be.

Patel is also the Minister that asked officials to explore the construction of an asylum processing centre on Ascension Island, a British overseas territory more than 4,000 miles from the UK in the south Atlantic, for migrants coming to Britain.

Priti happy now the pedo files are safely gone

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POLITICS AND EVENTS

Mid January 2021

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LIVERPOOL DROP BEHIND A

draw is rarely good enough at the top of the table.

It was always going to be a goalless draw. Liverpool didn’t want United pulling six points clear, and United didn’t want Liverpool drawing level, so the game was tight. Liverpool had the major share of the possession, and let 17 shots off, only 3 of which were on target. United did slightly better with 4 shots on target, half of their total.

Indeed both teams committed more fouls than had shots on target, 15 for Liverpool and 6 for United, so it was a bit of a tetchy game with no Covid spreading goal celebrations. Surprisingly for their lack of possession, United were caught offside eight times to Livepool’s one. The Merseysiders’ keeper Allison was their best player and made two greats saves late on. United’s best players

were again Rashford and Pogba, but Henderson was influential in midfield for Liverpool. Then the unthinkable happened. In the later match, Manchester City scored three goals against Crystal Palace to go second, pushing up and coming Leicester City down to third place, and last week’s league leaders Liverpool down to fourth. A draw really isn’t good enough.

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Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

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SPORTSMEN OF THE YEAR WITH A SOCIAL CONSCIENCE

obbie Savage: Last year he was condemned abuse and bad behaviour at grassroots football matches by spectators and parents, often then copied by youngsters. Inspired by the public reaction, Robbie put together his own 10-point plan for curbing this but also improving the game at that level. Many of his points have been adopted by the FA.

Often we read of highly paid sportsmen behaving badly, but I would like to pick out a few who have set good examples outside of sport this year.

With participation levels among young boys in sport falling and with restrictions this year on sport at grassroots, Robbie has told Boris Johnson “You don’t know what you’re doing.” In a webinar summit with MPs and top-level Football Association delegates, Savage renewed his call for kids to play organised sport while schools remain open. The Government’s own top advisors on Covid 19 also felt there was no reason to ban youth sport outdoors. Read more @ https://tinyurl. com/y72cqegb Marcus Rashford MBE: Marcus’ battles with the Government have been well documented leading to u-turns after his pleas to first provide free meals for the poorest children in the half term break. Then extending to give holiday help in the future for children on the Free School Meals scheme with more school holiday activities and making permanent the ￡20 weekly increase in Universal Credit as well as increasing the value of Healthy Start vouchers for foodstuffs and making that available to ALL on Universal Credit. However Marcus, with the support of his family has been involved in schemes to help underprivileged children before his petition on providing meals for children in the holidays reached over 1million signatures.

Last year his ‘shoe box’ appeal saw the Rashfords link up with Selfridges to provide basic essentials to help people in the city’s homeless shelters. He personally delivered 300 of the 1,200 boxes delivered. This year he teamed up with charity ‘Fareshare’ which raised ￡20million for meals for schoolchildren across Greater Manchester. In the early stages of the pandemic a ‘Players Together’ initiative supported NHS Charities Together by raising ￡4million between them. This campaign was spearheaded by Rashford, Liverpool captain Jordan Henderson included Harry Kane, Harry Maguire, Virgil van Dijk, Raheem Sterling and Kevin De Bruyne. His greatest achievement might be the example set to many youngsters like 7 year Jack who wrote to Marcus saying “You have inspired me because you’re so thoughtful and helped children through the hardest

times of their life and “You make me want to help others and be a better person.” Marcus has appeared throughout as humble and dignified throughout replying to Jack: “Keep being kind. That’s what makes the world go round”. Kevin Sinfield MBE: Kevin has raised more than 2.5 million for his good friend Rob Burrow and MND (Motor Neurone Disease) Association. Loyalty is epitomised by Kevin who won every honour in Rugby League playing three decades for his club, Leeds Rhinos, where he continues to work as Director of Rugby. So it was not surprising to hear he wanted to support his long term teammate Rob, who retired in 2017 before revealing his illness in December 2019. Kevin has recently completed his challenge of running seven marathons in seven days in support of his friend. Astonishingly he

completed the challenge averaging 3 hours 41 minutes for the 7 marathons. Fittingly he finished the last one in Saddleworth in his home town of Oldham.# # Global average time for one marathon is 4 hours 21 minutes. Didier Drogba: The Ivory Coast international has been raising funds through his Foundation for over a decade helping children through health and educational projects. However this year he has joined with other African footballers in condemning suggestions made by two France-based doctors that Africa should be used as a test site for a solution to the coronavirus crisis. He wrote on Twitter “Africa is not a testing lab. Do not take African people as human guinea pigs! It is absolutely disgusting and African leaders have a responsibility to protect their populations from those horrendous conspiracies.” Other footballers have endorsed Didier’s views such

as Istanbul Basaksehir forward Demba Ba, former Barcelona and Inter forward Samuel Eto’o, and Cameroon international Aurelien Chedjou. Lewis Hamilton: Lewis caused controversy at this year’s Tuscan Grand Prix wearing a T-shirt bearing the words ‘Arrest the cops that killed Breonna Taylor’. This was in contravention of the FIA rules as a signatory to the Olympic charter which forbids any form of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda. He commented “People talk about sport not being a place for politics but ultimately it is a human rights issue and that is something we should be pushing towards. We have a huge, amazing group of people that watch our sport from different backgrounds and cultures and we should be pushing positive messages towards them, especially for equality.” Odion Ighala: Manchester United and Nigerian international said, referring to recent atrocities in Lagos, “I am ashamed of this government, we are tired of you guys and we can’t take this any more,” he added. He was joined in his condemnation of Nigeria’s Federal Government by many celebrities including World boxing champion, Anthony Joshua. Sadio Mane: Despite his fame and wealth, Mane clearly hasn’t forgotten his roots. Aware of the povertystricken conditions in his home village of Bambaly he paid for a hospital to be built there. Mane donated ￡250,000 to fund a new secondary school and has visited the site to check its progress. Amid the outbreak of coronavirus, Mane donated ￡41,000 to health authorities in Senegal. Such is his humility he said “I do not need to display luxury cars, luxury homes, trips and even planes. I prefer that my people receive a little of what life has given me.”

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POLITICS AND EVENTS

Mid January 2021

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The moral for the England manager is to play Rashford somewhere, anywhere, and you’ll see a goal, with Rashford involved somewhere

Liverpool To Beat THEM NEXT GAME

erhaps! After 17 games of the English Premier League played, Manchester United have gone three points of rivals Liverpool thanks to a goal scored by Pogba from a cross by Marcus Rashford. A single goal in the game away to Liverpool on Sunday could put them six points ahead or allow Liverpool to inch ahead

on superior goal difference.

United are on a winning streak and the form of United’s English forward Marcus Rashford is significant. Both club and country play him all over the front line, but in his last 14 appearances for his club, he’s scored 6 goals and made the assist in a further 5. The moral for the England

Are we Book 5 saying that the gap between

Burnley and Manchester United is greater than that between Crawley and#1Leeds? Course not! Sudoku

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manager is to play Rashford somewhere, anywhere, and you’ll see a goal, with Rashford involved somewhere.

Ah yes, Burnley; hovering above the third relegation place where Fulham have two games in hand. At that end of the table you can’t expect to win these games; if you do, you’re quickly racing up the table. Burnley were at home, had about half the possession, Intermediate and let off Sudoku Puzzles by KrazyDad almost as many shots as United, all off target. They committed a couple more fouls than United, yet received only one yellow Sudoku #2 card to their opponents’ two. Perhaps they need to try harder. This is the Premier League; you are premier quality. There are seventy-two teams in the English Football League who’d love to take your place. One of these teams is Crawley Town, who last weekend took a place in the 4th Round of the FA Cup that Leeds United thought might have been theirs.

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Are we saying that the gap between Burnley and Manchester United is greater than that between Crawley and Leeds? Course not, it was Rashford, on fire turning the game as easily as he turns a Prime Minister’s mind and coming out winning! We salute you, young man, or as Gavin Williamson might say “Yunkstir.” Stanley Acrimonious

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In 14 club appearances, Rashford has scored 6 goals and assisted a further 5

THE

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Mid January 2021

POLITICS AND EVENTS

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THE PREMIER LEAGUE

ANYONE CAN WIN IT

Manchester United take the lead as Liverpool fizzle out in a bore draw. Behind them anyone from the top ten in the Premier league in with a chance of winning it. Pos.

Team

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GD.

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Man Utd Man City Leicester Liverpool Tottenham Hotspur Everton Chelsea Southampton West Ham Aston Villa

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10 15 12 16 16 7 12 5 4 13

37 35 35 34 33 32 29 29 29 26